Reading Decathlon at IRO Litfest Festival at Hyderabad

The IRO Lit Festival is a platform created by the Food 4 Thought Foundation to promote reading habits. It had organized a Reading Decathlon (a national level reading olympiad) on the 10th of February in Hyderabad. The participating teams were from 6 different states- Assam, Telangana, Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Meghalaya. Our students, Zoya Khan (class 11) and Adwika Srivastava (Class 9) made a powerful team and won the the first prize. The school is proud of their accomplishment.

As per the organizers, this Decathlon intends to not only test the knowledge of the students but also their perseverance, patience and calmness. Seth M.R. Jaipuria school, by creating a silence time ritual, trains the students to embrace stillness thereby helping them to navigate strategically through raging tides.

The competition spread across 10 rounds based on different forms of reading like Skimming, Intensive, Extensive and Scanning with 20 questions in each round! Sitting through 10 elaborate rounds, 200 questions, with the live scorecard on the screen rapidly updating, the timer clicking and the hearts beating loudly, surely is an achievement to be proud of!.

Being ardent readers, both Zoya and Adwika performed brilliantly well! They not only caught the audience’s attention but also won admiration from the other teams. The same teams who were leading in the first two rounds and had earlier expressed their confidence of winning the competition but, were checked just in time by their teacher and reminded, “Don’t underestimate team Jaipuria. You have no idea what they’re all about! Strong, Skilful and Determined!”

To many it may sound unusual that a competing team would speak so highly of an opponent but it did. We humbly thanked her, valued and honoured her high estimation because….the competition notwithstanding, we were enveloped in an environment of love and compassion (and also because what she said was so right!)

Both Zoya and Adwika had their English Literature exam shortly after the event but they burnt the candles at both ends and dedicatedly prepared for the competition.
(And simultaneously pleaded with Milton and
Shakespeare to soften the hearts of their
English teachers so that their ‘Paradise is not
Lost’ and the examination goes like
‘A ‘Midsummer Night’s Dream.’)

The syllabus was vast like an ocean but this determined team was afloat. From Classical Works to Anime, Manga, Manha and Comics, from Research Reports to Movie Adaptations, from Book Series of Authors to multitudinous Poetry, from Swift Reads to Etymologies, there was nothing that wasn’t tested.

From being dubious about opting for a ‘double bonus’ to doodling before the next question (…they felt 45 seconds was a lot of time for them to lock their answers. Thanks to their preparedness and consistency in reading books) they jumped through hoops, hand in hand, towards victory

And voila! They took over the territory in no time.
Their performance was an outcome of their unrelenting effort and sincerity.
Their happiness was palpable!

Zoya and Adwika have proven, that reading books never goes out of style. Even after winning the competition, they purchased books at the Hyderabad airport, and when aboard the plane, read one chapter after another in the reading light, when the cabin lights were switched off.
Ardent and enthusiastic readers like Zoya and Adwika are an inspiration to their juniors and a testimony to the fact that this generation can make carrying books in hand, fashionable again!